Misplaced blamehttp://www.hcn.org/issues/44.4/misplaced-blame
As a longtime subscriber, I was disturbed by the article by Tom Zoellner, and by his efforts to demonize those he disagrees with (HCN, 2/20/12, "Extreme Arizona").

The shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was not a political assassination. Rather, it was a delusional act of a schizophrenic in a psychotic episode. That Mr. Zoellner would assign blame to conservatives is a reflection of the hatred he harbors, not the political movement he so hates. Shame on High Country News for publishing this screed and advancing the notion that conservatives are responsible for the actions of a severely mentally disabled individual.

R. Barry CrookAspen, Colorado
]]>No publisherCommunitiesLetter to the editor2012/03/05 01:00:00 GMT-7ArticleSo where does that leave Marie Antoinette?http://www.hcn.org/issues/336/16731
HCN, who are so sure of themselves
that they are not content to simply make decisions about how they
live their own lives, but who insist on telling everyone else how
to live theirs too.

Let me get this
straight, though. Ms. Pritchett, you live outside of town on
presumably more than 1/8 of an acre — with all the drain on
the earth that entails, and live in a 2,000-square-foot house
(you’d better have at least four people there with you lest
you live against your own accords). For the record, I own a
9-year-old car and live in a townhouse of some 1,100 square feet in
a development that has 16 other townhomes all on less than one-half
of an acre — and feel no compulsion to declare myself
dictator, but I share your loathing in that I loathe you and your
fascist point of view. I assure you that hell will be full of
people like you who dare to dictate to others how to live their
lives. You will be queen of hell’s inner circle.

R. Barry Crook Aspen, Colorado

]]>No publisherLetter to the editorArticleHistory isn't black and whitehttp://www.hcn.org/issues/318/16186
Tribal wars over land and the dominion of that
land were a fact of life in the West. The West was not a bucolic
place where all Indians lived in peace with each other. They were
every bit as brutal as the U.S. Army. Our "tribe" was simply more
successful at consolidating dominion than others. Not pretty
— but a part of our history we must understand and
acknowledge.

My ancestor, Gen. George Crook, took many
"shots" from some of his fellow generals because of his belief that
fighting Indians was a last resort and not the way to approach the
"Indian problem," as it was called back then. He was widely known
among the tribes he dealt with as an honorable man who never lied
to them and who opposed draconian measures.

The history
of the West is not as black-and-white as Ms. Stange would have you
believe. Only fools would banish history from any age’s
landscape.

R. Barry Crook
Aspen, Colorado

]]>No publisherLetter to the editorArticleI'm celebrating!http://www.hcn.org/issues/285/15087
It seems like our
culture is no longer permitted to celebrate the seminal events of
our history — while all other cultures are permitted to not
only celebrate theirs, but to also demonize mine. I do so, not to
celebrate the "Americanization of the West" that brought the demise
of the native Indian domain, but to celebrate the importance of the
expedition to the triumph of the United States of America from the
Atlantic to the Pacific in securing these lands from Spain, France
and Great Britain.

I make no apology for celebrating the
country as it exists today — even if that meant the end of
the native Indian nations that were supplanted in its growth. Would
you prefer that the America we know have stopped at the Mississippi
River and been peppered with a patchwork of native Indian nations?
I’m fine with the country as it exists today — and the
contribution of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, and the men and
lone woman (a native Indian at that) of the Corps of Discovery to
its history. Let’s party!